Cross Roads Strategies

Once upon a time, there was a farmer who wanted to run a profitable farm. But farms can be complicated and he didn’t like to hire help or ask the county agent for advice. “Nobody knows this farm like I do,” he thought.

One day, he traveled to town and overheard a merchant who was lamenting the fact that he did not have enough bacon for his customers. “Oh, this town loves bacon so much…I could sell as much as I could handle.” With this, the farmer went back to his farm and decided to only grow pigs on his farm. “It’s too much trouble having to deal with so many different animals anyway,” said the farmer. He looked at the other animals he had charge over in the farm: the two horses, the dozen cows and the flock of 18 sheep. "If all my animals were alike, then life would be simpler and I would only have to manage pigs.” So the farmer did away with his two horses, 12 cows and 18 sheep and then went out and employed only pigs.

This made managing the farm much simpler. “Dealing with the demands of all those different animals was too much trouble, anyway,” thought the farmer. However, the farmer soon ran into problems. Without horses, he could not plow the field. “I was so intent on bacon, I forgot that I needed crops for my family,” said the farmer sadly. Without cows, the pasture was overrun with weeds and he was without milk. “I never realized how helpful those cows were.” And sans sheep, the farmer was without sweaters and woolen underwear in the winter.

To top it off, the merchant stopped asking for bacon as fickle customer tastes had moved to low-fat preferences. With a bunch of single-minded producers, the farmer quickly went out of business. He sold his farm to a developer at a loss and became a hermit…never heard from again. As a side note, the horses became very successful at the local track, bringing their owner millions of dollars in winnings. The sheep won numerous county fair ribbons for a herder who became famous as “Mutton Jeff.” And the cows became the basis for a vibrant ice cream franchise.

The Morals? While not always easy, the greatest success for an organization comes when a manager steps up and not only manages, but appreciates and leverages the diversity – in talent, background and even temperament – of his employees. To settle for anything else, leaves you with a lot of unproductive boars.